http://www.travelblog.org/Bloggers/Wondering Naturalists/ Travel adventures in journals and photos from Wondering Naturalists en-us Sun, 12 Oct 2008 01:56:56 BST Sun, 12 Oct 2008 01:56:56 BST Well we are back home in Newfield New York after 10250 miles logged in 79 days of traveling. Thanks to our wonderful friend and neighbor Gundy who stopped by weekly to look after our house and water the plants our home seems as we left it and the plants have never looked better.The final leg of our journey saw us leaving Portland OR and Rob Leila and Leo early on the 21st of April. We tra http://www.travelblog.org//North-America/United-States/New-York/Ithaca/blog-274213.html Though Newport and Charleston previous blog are two nearby ports on Oregon's central coast they are quite different. Charleston is an earthy fishing town but there was great fear that the salmon fishery was to be closed this year. We got the impression that quite a few people were unemployed. One of our neighbors was a veteran of the Kuwait and the Iraq wars and was living full time in his t http://www.travelblog.org//North-America/United-States/Oregon/Portland/blog-272286.html The colors of Nevada are a complete reversal of expectations created by six weeks in California. We crossed into Nevada east of Donner Pass and the miles of evergreen trees and snow gave way to chaparral and the subtle colors of sage and tumbleweed. Much to our surprise we learned that tumbleweed is a foreign invasive species Itrsquos a part of our western legendshelliprdquoSee them tu http://www.travelblog.org//North-America/United-States/Nevada/Reno/blog-266802.html This entry covers our trip from Fort Bidwell CA to Valley of the Rogue OR where we spent three days and the five days we stayed in Coos Bay on the south Oregon coast.Our last night in Fort Bidwell saw snow and wind. We had planned to take a shortcut over Fandango Pass but decided given the snow that we had better take a longer but less elevated route to our next stop at Valley of the Rogue http://www.travelblog.org//North-America/United-States/Oregon/Coos-Bay/blog-266421.html Here we are in Oregon playing catchup on blogs we have neglected due to too much living in the present. We knew this would eventually happen This missive covers the time we spent in the Bay area both before and after our Yosemite trip. Since we had done most of the city stuff on two previous visits to San Francisco we devoted this period to spending time with friends our son Nick and severa http://www.travelblog.org//North-America/United-States/California/San-Francisco/blog-264192.html One of the major reasons that we chose to drive to the west coast was to visit our two sons who live in Berkeley CA and Portland Oregon. We spent several weeks in the San FranciscoBerkeley area at a regional park between Oakland and Castro Valley. This park and some of our adventures in the area will be the subject of another blog. Instead of doing a lot of ldquocityrdquo stuff in the are http://www.travelblog.org//North-America/United-States/California/Yosemite-National-Park/blog-262130.html For three days we stayed at Sunset State Beach near Watsonville in the Monterey Bay area about 90 miles south of San Francisco. California has many state beaches some with camping some without. Some allow dogs on the beach some do not. No services were provided at Sunset Beach so we were dry camping here. We could not help comparing coastal development in Florida where we spent three months http://www.travelblog.org//North-America/United-States/California/blog-258343.html In this blog entry we are using a different approach that we hope will integrate the written comments and the pictures better by putting most of the text in the captions for the pictures. We hope you like it. http://www.travelblog.org//North-America/United-States/California/Big-Sur/blog-255957.html We are coming to the end of a 5day stay at a state park in Morro Bay a part of the Central Coast of California that seems to have everything a reasonable person could want. First the scenery is dropdead beautiful. The entrance to the bay is marked by Morro Rock a 23 millionyearold volcanic plug the first of some nine that are arranged in a line between Morro Bay and San Luis Obispo. Morro http://www.travelblog.org//North-America/United-States/California/San-Luis-Obispo/blog-253580.html We left San Diego for El Capitan State Beach just north of Santa Barbara on Friday 29 Feb Leap Year. Jon was apprehensive about dragging our home on Interstate 5 through the tangle of freeways that is Los Angeles. Actually it went smoothly except at the point when the storage compartment holding our sewer dump hose opened and resulted in dragging 25 feet of hose down the freeway. Fortunate http://www.travelblog.org//North-America/United-States/California/Santa-Barbara/blog-252534.html We have seven days in this beautiful most southern part of California. On Saturday we drove with great anticipation to the Borderfield State Park Tijuana River Estuary an area recommended by the birding guide for southern California. We got there and found that because there had just been significant rainstorm the area was highly contaminated with sewage from Tijuana via the Tijuana River http://www.travelblog.org//North-America/United-States/California/San-Diego/blog-251137.html Spent Tuesday night 19 Feb in an RV park in Deming New Mexico elevation 4200 ft with the encouraging name ldquoRoadrunner RV Resort.rdquo However no roadrunners were evident and it was definitely not a resortmdasha gravelfilled expanse marked off into many individual parking spaces and surrounded by a chainlink fence. When you are trying to make time one must occasionally sacrifice http://www.travelblog.org//North-America/United-States/California/blog-249637.html Last night 16 Feb we stayed at the Tom Sawyer Campground on the Mississippi River across from Memphis. The river is high and the current is ripping. Many trees were floating downstream at an amazing rate of speed. It seemed like a lovely campground with river frontage and many trails. Unfortunately we didnrsquot have time to explore and left this morning early. Our camping spot was only http://www.travelblog.org//North-America/United-States/Texas/blog-248970.html We are assuming that the first leg of our trip will eventually seem pretty funny. We were leaving Newfield on Thursday the 14th of February but we couldnrsquot get one of the two locks on the trailer door to work. However the deadbolt lock worked find so we figured that it would keep the door closed. We began driving west on I86 toward Erie PA. Part of the road in the western part of New http://www.travelblog.org//North-America/United-States/Ohio/Ashtabula/blog-247012.html We were delayed on Monday by 25F windchill. Tuesday and today we experienced snow sleet and freezing rain. Schools were closed so our road was not plowed However we keep discovering things we forgot to do so it may be for the best. Tomorrow looks good and we are hoping our next entry will be from on the road. http://www.travelblog.org//North-America/United-States/New-York/blog-245933.html Our departure date is now this coming Monday 10 Feb. 2008 about one month later than we had originally planned. A persistent case of Lyme disease can change your plans but I just got the blessing to leave from the rheumatologist today. Cold fronts march across the plains bringing blizzards to the north and tornados to the south while we study the weather maps ready the house for abandonment http://www.travelblog.org//North-America/United-States/New-York/blog-243886.html